Saturday, September 12, 2015

O boy. I never thought I'd think this: maybe bedsharing with a nursing infant is the way to go?

I shunned the idea from the first I had ever heard of it, mostly because ten years ago, a couple at my aunt's parish rolled over their infant in the night, crushing him. The very though of co-sleeping with a babe has been the furthest from my mind since then.

And, I can't fail to mention that while I knew of some families who did this, all of the professional voices I heard from baby experts to my parents warned me of the inherent dangers of such a practice.

Plus, no one ever told me how to do such a thing.

Until... now.

I'm constantly reading up on some aspect of my new profession, that is, motherhood. From Montessori education to nutrition to baby care, I have a constant book-on-loan from our local library or book-in-transit from abebooks.com.

So when a recent book, Diaper Free, suggested that along with no diapers, bedsharing is the way to go with a nursing infant, I ventured to read up on it. This led me to several books including the out-of-print Three in a Bed.

Eventually, due to the friend's influence that I mentioned in an earlier post, I found a surprising ally in the bedsharing phenomenon in La Lech League, and they have a new campaign to promote "Safe Sleep" with infants through their book, Sweet Sleep.

The benefits of bedsharing include:

decreased or eliminated risk of SIDS

better sleep for mom and baby

baby doesn't need to cry to nurse, only needs to nudge mom... or if mom is topless, just latch on while she continues to snooze

immediate help for baby for elimination (if you so choose to do the diaper-free method)

emotional security for baby

save money on not buying crib or getting larger home with separate bedroom for nursery

it's just snuggly!

So, with so many benefits, why don't midwives help moms learn to bedshare after birth? I certainly wasn't made aware of any of these benefits nor was I helped to understand how to safely bedshare if I was going to consider doing it.

It's the chicken pox, people. It's not that big of a deal. Well, at least it used to not be that big of a deal, back when kids routinely got it... and happily got out of a week or more of school as a result. As described (accurately) in the article, the chicken pox isn't that serious for kids. The older you are, or if you have a weak immune system, the risks go up. But, generally speaking, it means itchy blisters and rash and fatigue.

But, apart from it being a generally benign illness that could actually have beneficial future outcome for those that contract it (meaning: it reduces or eliminates your risk of getting the far more serious illness Shingles later in life... but now Shingles is on the rise!), the part that shocked me the most about the news was the speculative reason why these two ball players got the pox:

Yost said shortstop Alcides Escobar was vaccinated just recently as part of requirements for citizenship, though it's unclear whether that may have introduced the virus to the clubhouse.

WHAT!?

You mean that prospective citizens are required to get vaccinated in order to become American?!

How unabashedly UN-American is that?!

First of all, we don't require folks to have vaccinations in order to visit our country, and folks visiting and traveling may even come into contact with more people than those moving here. Further, if the efficacy of vaccines is questioned by many, then why are vaccines being shoved into the bodies of future Americans as some sort of savior? These people are moving to the United States in order to have more freedoms, not to have them taken away.

I could say a lot about vaccinations right now, but I'll just leave you with this noteworthy observation from a chiropractor in Florida:

We’ve essentially swapped one form of the disease for another, without
considering the costs or risks associated with kicking the burden down
the line.